Hi Kevin,
Welcome to your personalized Grit Lab Report!
We will go week by week, reviewing everything you have told us through Poll Everywhere.
We hope this will help you reflect on what you have learned and experienced during Grit Lab.
Important note!
Sometimes, you may not have been able to respond to all polls.
If the data for one of the polls is missing, the automatic report will display NA, or ““.
Okay, let’s get started!
The first half of Grit Lab delves deep intp the passion facet of Grit.
We like to call it Choose Easy, because we think gritty people pursue what they enjoy.
Putting it graphically, gritty people tend to pursue the intersection of these four circles.
The first time we met, you told us where you were on the grit rubric.
Regarding passion you picked Stage 3: I’m actively figuring out what my interests are by trying one or more of them out in some way .
Regarding perseverance you picked .
As you know, grit grows, so don’t worry if you are not yet where you’d like to be in your grit journey.
Hopefully, this class will help you become grittier each day.
In week 2, we looked at your interests.
Interest is an emotion, and it is the opposite of boredom.
Your interests are the activities or subjects that spontaneously grab your attention.
Trying things out and seeing how you feel is the best way to refine your interests.
In week 3, we studied values, your beliefs about what is important.
You said your top three values were NA, NA, and NA.
You wrote a “This I Believe” essay, and here’s where you located it on Schwartz’s value taxonomy.
When we talked about strengths in week 4, you said your personality strength was agreeableness.
You said your top three talents were NA, NA, and NA.
We then talked about goal hierarchies.
You said you had a general intuition (but nothing specific yet) about your top-level goal.
We discussed self-concordance, or how much a goal aligns to your deeply held values and beliefs.
A goal you said you will be pursuing for the next six months is to get a job .
Here is how self-concordant that goal was:
Don’t worry if your self-concordance for that particular goal is low.
It might mean that you need to reframe that goal in a way that makes it more relevant to your deep self, or change it!
Remember that self-concordance is goal specific, so other goals might be more self-concordant.
We then transitioned to the second part of Grit Lab:
Work Smart
In week 6, we looked at goal setting and planning.
You WOOPed!
For your Wish, what you wanted to accomplish, you said Start stretching daily again .
For your Outcome, what would happen if your wish came true, you said I’ll feel more healthy .
For you Obstacle, what it is within you that stands in your way, you said Tiredness .
For your Plan, you created this when-then plan to achieve your goal: When I about to get ready for bed, I’ll start my stretches. .
Whether you changed your WOOP or stuck to that one, here’s where it landed between being a total fail, and going exactly according to plan.
And here’s how much you learned
These goals are hard, and despite our best efforts, our plans can fail.
The important thing is that you learn something along the way!
In week 7, we talked about deliberate practice.
You shared you’ve done daily practice in Music .
We learned that deliberate practice requires a challenging, hyperspecific goal, maximum concentration, instant feedback, and is often done alone.
In week 8, we discussed feedback.
Even though feedback can be hard to take, it is often the key to improve. So if you want to improve, seek it actively!
You said you felt Anxious when receiving critical feedback, and Anxious when receiving positive feedback.
We then turned to learning about stress.
In week 9, you reported feeling a lot of stress in your life right now, the primary source of it being future .
We also talked about adversity and failure.
Although related, adversity and failure are different:
Adversity happens to us, whereas failure is something for which we are generally more responsible.
However, how we interpret stress and failure matters…
Interestingly, research has found that people who believe that stress can facilitate learning and growth experience enhanced performance, well-being, and health.
And failure—not achieving a particular goal—can be interpreted as “I’m learning!” and lead you to look for the lesson in that experience.
We closed the Work Smart section of the class by talking about habits.
Throughout the semester, you practice habit building using your Build-A-Habit Guide book.
You describe the habit you chose as Health .
Whether you were successful in habit building or not, this is how much you learned.
Finally, what good is grit if we do not dream for others?
So, we transitioned to Paying it Forward.
In week 10, we looked at mentors: role models that take an active role in your growth.
Hopefully, your mentor was authoritative, being both supportive and demanding.
Here’s how you described them:
You also wrote a gratitude letter to .
In one word, you said it made you feel .
One way of paying it forward is having a prosocial, beyond-the-self purpose. Here’s how you responded to items assessing that.
… and so quickly we arrived at the end of the semester.
Here’s how your mood varied over these weeks.
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Do you notice any patterns? Is there anything that correlates with your mood?
Here you can scroll through all the quotes you wrote to summarize each class.
| |
| An appreciation for grit should highlight, not obscure, the importance of context and opportunity. |
| Interest is an emotion. |
| Values are relatively stable but do show some change over time. |
| Goal hierarchies enable harmony and reduce conflict. |
| Goals help bridge the intention-action gap. |
| How good you get at anything depends on more than just innate talent. |
| Feedback is informational and past-oriented, whereas advice is actionable and future-oriented. |
| The stress response is an adaptation to new challenges. |
| Don't rely on willpower. Change the situation instead. |
| Role models give us motivation and information. |
| People who can accurately perceive others' emotions tend to be better team players. |
In the final class, we looked back to everything we’ve learned together and to how our passion and perseverance evolved during this class.
Here are the comments from your Grit Lab Teammates:
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| Shannon Brooks |
| It was pleasure taking GritLab with you Kevin! I appreciate your humor and always putting up with me and May's crazy conversations. I love your humility, your ability to mentor and help those around you, and your drive to continue education beyond undergrad. I appreciate your calm yet inviting aura.
I throughly enjoyed your presentation and it was interesting to learn about the history of origami. I was cool to know you challenged yourself with trying to make 37 models of origami. Furthermore, I never knew about the origins and history, it was very enriching and cool to see the earliest records of the craft. |
| May Lee |
| Dear Kevin,
I want to extend my sincere gratitude for your invaluable contributions as a member of Team 10. It's been a delight to work with you, and I couldn't be happier about our collaboration in this dream team. Your ability to listen attentively during our 16-minute conversations has been a true asset to the group. Your patience and genuine interest in each team member's thoughts and ideas created an inclusive and supportive atmosphere, making our team dynamic truly exceptional. During our breaks and presentation exchanges, I've thoroughly enjoyed our conversations and the exchange of ideas. Your thoughtful contributions and wise insights showcase your capacity not only as a great listener but also as a valuable team player. I also want to acknowledge your responsible and proactive approach, always being the first to be seated and ensuring that no one felt alone in the team – even taking care of our name cards. Your sense of responsibility has not gone unnoticed and has contributed significantly to the smooth functioning of our team.
Regarding your Discovery presentation, I was truly impressed by the depth of your exploration into origami. Your knowledge of the different styles and folds was not only fascinating but also a testament to your passion for delving deep into subjects that intrigue you. I have no doubt that your ability to immerse yourself in a topic will serve you well in grad school, and I wish you all the best in your academic endeavors. May you continue to thrive and excel in all your future pursuits!
Warm regards,
May |
We hope you have emerged from Grit Lab a little grittier than you started.
Do you want to see how your grit rubric changed?
Drumroll please…
Don’t worry if the rubric doesn’t yet reflect growth. It is only a coarse measure that cannot replace your own self-reflection.
In any case, grit is not built in a day…
…remember that progress is never smooth…
…so stay passionate and persevering in the lifelong quest of choosing easy, working smart, and paying it forward.
With grit and gratitude,
Angela and the Grit Lab team.